The polls for the election of a 217-member constituent assembly tasked with writing a new constitution opened at 7 a.m., and at 4 p.m. Tunisia's official elections committee said voter turnout was close to 70 percent -- far higher than expected.

About 7 million of Tunisia's 10.4 million people are eligible to vote.

There was a festive atmosphere throughout the day in the capital, Tunis, where primary schools converted into polling stations received the streams of voters across the city and from all walks of life.

Young men waved Tunisia's red and white flag from the windows of honking cars on the capital's streets. Blue ink, administered at election booths to indicate a person had voted, stained the fingers of men and women, young and old alike.

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The answer is: far more than you might imagine. For one thing, that loaf can be "read" as if it were a core sample extracted from the heart of a grim global economy. Looked at another way, it reveals some of the crucial fault lines of world politics, including the origins of the Arab spring that has now become a summer of discontent.

Consider this: between June 2010 and June 2011, world grain prices almost doubled. In many places on this planet, that proved an unmitigated catastrophe. In those same months, several governments fell, rioting broke out in cities from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, to Nairobi, Kenya, and most disturbingly three new wars began in Libya, Yemen, and Syria. Even on Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, Bedouin tribes are now in revolt against the country's interim government and manning their own armed roadblocks.

And in each of these situations, the initial trouble was traceable, at least in part, to the price of that loaf of bread. If these upheavals were not "resource conflicts" in the formal sense of the term, think of them at least as bread-triggered upheavals.

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They were sentenced to 35 years each in prison.

The conviction of Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Leila Trabelsi followed a day-long trial before the Tunis criminal court. The couple went into exile on Jan. 14 in Saudi Arabia after a month-long uprising that sparked a string of other uprisings in the Arab world.

Ben Ali, 74, vigorously denied the charges in a statement through his French lawyer, calling the proceedings a "shameful masquerade of the justice of the victorious."

Saudi Arabia did not respond to an extradition request, and some Tunisians expressed frustration that he would not be present for his judgment.

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The Tunis Criminal Court is hearing two embezzlement, money laundering and drug trafficking cases against Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. It follows the discovery of around $27 million in jewels and cash plus drugs and weapons at two palaces outside Tunis after he flew to Saudi Arabia on Jan. 14.

Ben Ali, 74, vigorously denied the charges in a statement through his French lawyer, calling the proceedings a "shameful masquerade of the justice of the victorious."

Five public defenders have been assigned to Ben Ali and his wife, Leila Trabelsi, who is accused in one of the two cases in Monday's trial. Tunisian law prohibits a foreign lawyer from defending a client in absentia, judicial officials said, meaning French lawyer Jean-Yves Le Borgne cannot take part in proceedings.

Saudi Arabia did not respond to an extradition request, and some Tunisians expressed frustration that he would not be present for his judgment. A verdict could come later Monday.

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Prime Minister Beji Caid Essebsi told the Arabic Al-Jazeera news channel that the president was wanted on 93 counts on charges ranging from abuse of power and embezzlement to drug trafficking.

Military courts will handle 27 of those charges, the state news agency reported.

Earlier statements from the Ministry of Justice said the first trial will focus on drugs and weapons found at the presidential palace in Carthage.

The next one will be over $27 million (euro18.69 million) in jewelry and foreign currency found in another palace.

Zine Abidine Ben Ali ruled Tunisia for 23 years until a monthlong popular uprising forced him to flee to Saudi Arabia on Jan. 14.

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TAP says the fishing boat was believed to have set sail from Libya and was en route to Italy.

The Thursday report said its passengers, which include women and children, are from Africa and Asia.

The boat stalled some 20 miles off the Kerkennah islands in southern Tunisia on Tuesday night in foul weather than also hampered rescue operations.

Some 570 passengers were rescued and authorities attribute the large number of missing from the stampede to get off the ship and board inflatable rafts during the storm.

Survivors were transferred to Choucha refugee camp near the Tunisia-Libya border.

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The White House goes back on much of Deputy National Security Advisor, John Brennan's, detailing of the bin Laden raid:

During a press briefing Monday afternoon, Brennan offered up an uncertain but juicy narrative about the raid that killed the al-Qaida leader: Reportedly, bin Laden used one of his wives as a human shield; it was suggested bin Laden was armed; and Brennan said that bin Laden's son Khalid was killed in the raid.

Within hours, the White House had modified every one of these claims, reported Politico late last night:

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In the rebel stronghold of Benghazi in eastern Libya, meanwhile, relief workers and medical teams awaited the arrival of a passenger ferry carrying about 1,000 people -- mostly Libyan civilians and workers from Asia and Africa -- out of the besieged city of Misrata, the main rebel holdout in Gadhafi's territory.

Also aboard the vessel were the bodies of an Oscar-nominated documentary maker from Britain and an American photographer who were killed covering clashes Wednesday. A day earlier, the ferry arrived in Misrata, delivering food and medical supplies to the beleaguered population.

The reported capture of the border crossing followed three days of intense fighting outside the desert town of Nalut, about 140 miles (240 kilometers) southwest of the capital Tripoli, said a rebel leader, Shaban Abu Sitta. The area was in hands of anti-government forces last month before Libyan troops moved in.

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The Obama administration said it wouldn't block other nations from building support for the vote. However, there is a growing consensus in the White House that it's too late for a no-fly zone to have an effect in hampering Gadhafi, according to The New York Times, as the dictator's forces prepare to launch an assault on the rebel capital of Benghazi.

President Obama met with his National Security Council on Tuesday to consider a variety of other options to respond to the deteriorating situation.

Among those options are jamming Libyan government radio signals and financing the rebel forces with $32 billion in Libyan government and Qaddafi family funds frozen by the United States. That money could be used either for weapons or relief. The meeting broke without a decision, the official said.

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The Bahrain conflict is sectarian as much as pro-democracy, as the strategic Gulf island nation's majority Shiite Muslims see an opportunity to rid themselves of two centuries of rule by a Sunni monarchy.

But Gulf Sunni leaders worry that might give Shiite Iran a stepping stone to its arch-rival Saudi Arabia, connected to Bahrain by a wide causeway.

Instead, the Saudis and the other members of the Gulf Cooperation Council sent forces the other way, deploying about 1,000 troops by land and air and cementing the entire six-nation alliance to the fate of Bahrain's rulers, key U.S. allies as hosts of the U.S. Navy's 5th Fleet.

The first cross-border offensive against one of the rebellions sweeping the Mideast was not greeted with celebrations.

Shortly after word of the foreign military reinforcements began to spread through the island nation, protesters blocked roads in the capital Manama. Thousands of others swarmed into Pearl Square, the symbolic center of the monthlong revolt.

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Ghannouchi, 69, has been a major irritant to Tunisians behind the so-called "Jasmine Revolution" -- weeks of public upheaval that drove longtime autocratic President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali from power last month.

Even though Ben Ali fled to Saudi Arabia on Jan. 14, Ghannouchi -- who served for 11 years as his prime minister -- had promised to stay on to guide the country until elections this summer.

Ghannouchi's announcement on state TV and radio came a day after officials said at least four people had died in recent days in the capital during clashes between stone-throwing protesters and police.

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Soon after his speech, clashes erupted between protesters and government supporters in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, and gunshots were heard, according to footage by Al-Jazeera television.

Mubarak's half-way concession -- an end to his rule seven months down the road -- threatened to inflame frustration and anger among protesters, who have been peaceful in recent days but have made clear they will not end their unprecedented week-old wave of demonstrations until he is out.

The speech was immediately derided by protesters massed in Cairo's central Tahrir Square. Watching his speech on a giant TV, protesters booed and waved their shoes over their heads at his image in a sign of contempt. "Go, go, go! We are not leaving until he leaves," they chanted. One man screamed, "He doesn't want to say it, he doesn't want to say it."

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The Noor Group had remained online even after Egypt's four main Internet providers -- Link Egypt, Vodafone/Raya, Telecom Egypt, Etisalat Misr -- abruptly stopped shuttling Internet traffic into and out of the country Friday morning.

At about 11 p.m. local time Monday, the Noor Group became unreachable, said James Cowie, chief technology officer of Renesys, a security firm based in Manchester, N.H. Renesys monitors massive directories of "routes," or set paths that define how Web traffic moves from one place to another. The Noor Group's routes have disappeared, he said.

Cowie said engineers at the Noor Group and other service providers could quickly shut down the Internet by logging on to certain computers and changing a configuration file. The original Internet blackout on Friday took just 20 minutes to fully go into effect, he said.

Cell phone service was restored in Egypt starting Saturday but text messaging services have been disrupted as protests continue.

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The former president brokered a peace agreement between Israel and Egypt in 1978. He calls the unrest the most profound situation in the Middle East since he left office in 1981.

The Columbus Ledger-Enquirer reported Carter's remarks to the Sunday school class he teaches at Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains.

Mubarak was vice president when the peace accord was signed and became president in 1981 when Anwar al-Sadat was assassinated by opponents of the agreement with Israel.

Carter said that as Mubarak's 30-year rule has continued, the Egyptian leader has become more politically corrupt.

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The army made no attempt, however, to disperse some 5,000 protesters gathered at Tahrir Square, a plaza in the heart of downtown that protesters have occupied since Friday afternoon. They have violated a curfew to call for the ouster of President Hosni Mubarak's regime, which they blame for poverty, unemployment, widespread corruption and police brutality.

Nobel Peace laureate and democracy advocate Mohamed ElBaradei appeared in the square around 7 p.m.

"You are the owners of this revolution. You are the future," he told the cheering crowd. "Our essential demand is the departure of the regime and the beginning of a new Egypt in which each Egyptian lives in virtue, freedom and dignity."

One of the senior leaders of the outlawed Muslim Brotherhood, which wants to establish an Islamist state in the Arab world's most populous nation, told The Associated Press he was heading to Tahrir, or Liberation, Square to meet with other opposition leaders.

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Saturday's fast-moving developments across the north African nation marked a sharp turning point in President Hosni Mubarak's three-decade rule of Egypt.

Residents and shopkeepers in affluent neighborhoods boarded up their houses and stores against looters, who roamed the streets with knives and sticks, stealing what they could and destroying cars, windows and street signs. Gunfire rang out in some neighborhoods.

Tanks and armored personnel carriers fanned out across the city of 18 million, guarding key government buildings, and major tourist and archaeological sites. Among those singled out for special protection was the Egyptian Museum, home to some of the country's most treasured antiquities, and the Cabinet building. The military closed the pyramids on the outskirts of Cairo -- Egypt's premier tourist site.

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UPDATE (3:00 PM EST) Al Jazeera reports of looting in multiple Egyptian cities. The news organization also claims that one of its camera crews was mugged.

UPDATE (1:12 PM EST) From the annals of ironically humorous advice, John Kerry gives political pointers to Hosni Mubarak:

"I think he's got to speak more to the real issues that people feel,"

Iranian opposition leader Mir Hossein Mousavi supports the uprising in Egypt, but wants everyone to know that Iran started all this.

UPDATE (1:01 PM EST) Egyptian opposition leader Mohamed Elbaradei just finished speaking on Al Jazeera, expressing displeasure over how the United States and other countries chose "the middle ground." He insists that Egypt cannot stand unless Mubarak steps down immediately.

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"I think that we have to see how things move today and, obviously, the key here is for President Mubarak to respond to the needs of his people in a way that is more directly connected to their frustrations, much more so than apparently yesterday's speech succeeded in doing," the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee told The Associated Press Saturday on the sidelines of the Forum's annual meeting.

"I think he's got to speak more to the real issues that people feel," the Democrat from Massachusetts said. "Dismissing the government doesn't speak to some of those challenges."

Kerry's comments came just minutes after Egyptian state television reported that the Cabinet of Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif had resigned on Mubarak's orders.

Salil Shetty, the head of Amnesty International, told AP that Mubarak's decision to fire his Cabinet won't quell the anti-government protests that have shaken the country for five days.

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Marc Lynch likes Obama's Egypt policy so far:

I think the instant analysis badly misread his comments and the thrust of the administration's policy. His speech was actually pretty good, as is the rapidly evolving American policy. The administration, it seems to me, is trying hard to protect the protestors from an escalation of violent repression, giving Mubarak just enough rope to hang himself, while carefully preparing to ensure that a transition will go in the direction of a more democratic successor.

Tony Karon thinks that Obama is realistically suspicious of Egyptian democracy:

Democracy movements are attractive to Washington when they target a regime such as Iran's, but in allied autocracies, they're a problem. There's no way for Egypt to be democratic and exclude the Islamists from political participation. The same is true for most other parts of the Arab world

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